The Androids of Tara Part One

The one where Romana gets mistaken for an android...

This new adventure - Doctor Who's 101st story - opens with the Doctor slouching on the floor of the TARDIS playing chess with K-9. It feels like chess is a running theme between the Fourth Doctor and his robot dog, but in actual fact The Androids of Tara is only the second (and last) time the two have locked horns over the game. The Doctor really could do with getting a table and chair to sit on though, because lying spread-eagled across the TARDIS floor is somewhat ungainly (although perfectly in keeping with the unpredictability of his reclining choices at the start of his tenure).

Suddenly, out of the blue, dressed in her flowing ivory gown from The Ribos Operation, Romana appears, entering stage left, seemingly out of the TARDIS wall. Where's she been? What's over there to the left of the TARDIS doors, an area we've probably not seen since the early 1960s? Romana lands the TARDIS herself (although I notice that she, like the Doctor, leaves the brakes on, proving that River Song is still the better driver), taking charge in the ongoing quest for the six segments of the Key to Time.

It's a curious theme running through this season (and beyond) that Romana takes the lead in the quest, or at least continually attempts to keep the Doctor on track and focus him on the real task at hand (ie, saving the entire universe by doing what the White Guardian asked of them). Season 16 really is where the infantilisation of the Fourth Doctor begins, where the character's agency is slowly stripped away until he becomes the bumbling, childish buffoon we see in The Horns of Nimon. Throughout Seasons 16 and 17 we see Romana frequently taking the lead, or at least taking everything much more seriously than the Doctor.

Here, we have the Doctor insisting on taking a break from searching for the Key to Time so that he can go fishing instead. Apart from being terribly irresponsible (the balance of the universe is at stake, and all he wants to do is catch fish!), it weakens the agency of the main character, backgrounding him and his fripperies while the companion gets stuck in. While it's no bad thing that the companion gets more screen time and leverage on the plot, it's a sign of things to come, of a time when our hero seems more interested in cracking jokes and prat-falling than being an actual children's hero that adults adore.

It all looks gorgeous though, and you can tell that director Michael Hayes seems to be in love with the lush Leeds Castle location, as well as his achingly beautiful leading actress. Mary Tamm designed the striking purple and green outfit herself, and there's no denying that she looks positively regal as she strides confidently through the verdant foliage of Tara, searching for the fourth segment. And lo and behold, Romana manages to locate the segment less than eight minutes into the episode, proving that perhaps she should become the star of the show and let the Doctor get on with being a fool in the background. The universe feels like a safer place with Mary Tamm in charge!

But look, what's that lurking in the bushes, waiting to pounce on our innocent heroine? It's a terrifying wood beast, which is basically just a bloke in a furry suit wearing a troll mask. To be fair, Hayes keeps shots of the beast's immobile face to a minimum, showing it either very briefly, in constant motion, or from a distance, so as not to make it too clear that it's just a static mask. His valiant efforts are largely in vain, however, as it's still painfully obvious that this is A Really Rubbish Monster. They really should have ditched it altogether and had Romana endangered in some more believable way, but perhaps they were thinking of the monster merchandising... There was a prose sequel to this story in the 1995 anthology Decalog 2, in which the Seventh Doctor and Benny return to Tara and encounter a wood beast, but at least you can't see it!

Romana is rescued by the dashing, charming Count Grendel of Gracht, played with reliable panache by the great Peter Jeffrey, who was magnificent at playing smarmy bad guys throughout the 1960s and 70s. Having hurt her ankle in some pathetically predictable way, Romana is scooped up by Grendel and taken on horseback to his castle, which is Leeds Castle with a couple of minarets painted on top via an unconvincing glass shot. Nice try to mix things up a bit though.

I love Dudley Simpson's music score for this story, employing a harpsichord sound to evoke that medieval, Olde England atmosphere that suits the lush visuals so well. It's refreshingly distinctive, following far too many stories where Simpson just churns out a variation on a theme after having scored Doctor Who on and off since 1964. When new producer John Nathan-Turner stopped using Simpson in 1980, it was a wise decision because the man, while a genius, was virtually running on empty. This flourish proves he could still do it, but the workload of scoring up to 26 episodes of Doctor Who every year, as well as 13 episodes of Blake's 7 and the numerous other TV shows he wrote for (everything from The Tomorrow People to The Legend of King Arthur) means he was a gifted man spreading his talent far too thinly.

Romana soon learns that Grendel and his poisonous engineer Madame Lamia seem to think she is actually an android, and not a living, breathing person at all, and the scenes where they talk about her as a commodity are chilling. "Disassemble her," Grendel instructs Lamia. "We can cannibalise her for parts." When Lamia advances upon Romana with a buzzing meat saw it could be a scene straight out of the gothic Season 14, not the bright and breezy Season 16!

How does Madame Lamia get her hair to do that? It must take her hours to get it just right every morning, curling it into place and sticking it down before setting out for work!

Meanwhile, the Doctor's fishing is disturbed by the dashing, youthful Farrah and his ingenious electrically-charged sword (undoubtedly influenced by the lightsabers of Star Wars, which opened in UK cinemas just five months before David Fisher was commissioned to write this story). Farrah and grouchy Zadek take the Doctor to see Prince Reynart, hoping he will be able to fix the heir's broken android. Tom Baker buffoons his way through these scenes in a disappointingly flippant manner, turning glibness into an art form. He's good at it - all wide-eyed and toothy - but there's too much of it, he's too full-on and insincere for the viewer to take him seriously as a character at all. I feel sorry for his co-stars, and for David Fisher, who's crafted a gently charming little story in the traditions of a Hollywood swashbuckler, but Baker is sending it up, and damaging his own character with it.

Reynart explains that he is to be crowned king tomorrow, but the evil Count Grendel will do anything to stop him getting to the coronation on time. Reynart needs the Doctor to fix his broken android double so that Grendel can be distracted while the real heir gets crowned. Android engineering is a peasant's skill on Tara, so Reynart, Zadek and Farrah, being thoroughly genteel, can't do it themselves. The Doctor duly fixes alt-Reynart, and they all celebrate with plastic goblets of wine. Unfortunately, the wine's been drugged by the evil Grendel, and as the celebratory gathering slumps into unconsciousness, the villain of the piece stands over them, having thwarted Reynart's ruse before it's even started.

It's been a sedately paced but gorgeous episode, in the best traditions of a Doctor Who historical, only set on an alien planet that looks like England. I'm up for Mary Tamm becoming the real star of Doctor Who, because Tom Baker's flippancy is getting a little tiring now...

First broadcast: November 25th, 1978

Steve's Scoreboard
The Good: Michael Hayes makes the most of the lush, verdant Leeds Castle location.
The Bad: The Taran wood beast.
Overall score for episode: ★★★★★★★☆☆☆

"Would you like a jelly baby?" tally: 18

NEXT TIME: Part Two...

My reviews of this story's other episodes: Part Two; Part Three; Part Four

Find out birth/death dates, career information, and facts and trivia about this story's cast and crew at the Doctor Who Cast & Crew site: https://doctorwhocastandcrew.blogspot.com/2014/08/the-androids-of-tara.html

The Androids of Tara is available on BBC DVD as part of the Key to Time box set. Find it on Amazon - https://www.amazon.co.uk/Doctor-Who-Key-Time-Re-issue/dp/B002TOKFNM